Ljubljana is at a turning point. We must decide whether our city will be a shopping center intended for wealthy visitors, investors and tourists, or if it will be a place in which we can all live decently - regardless of the social situation and economic situation. We have almost a decade of investment and intensive renovation ehind us, which brought the center beautiful façades, additional bridges and numerous outlets. With all the glitter, the question about the impact of such development on the quality of life of the inhabitants of Ljubljana remained absent. Today it is obvious that it is becoming increasingly difficult for us to get an apartment, that high rental prices lead us to substandard housing on the outskirts of the city, that poorly paid and overworked jobs in the service sector have flourished, that those of us who cannot keep up with the overall increase in prices of products and services are being pushed out from the city streets, and that the new glittering image of the city is based on the exploitation of construction workers. There is no doubt that the mayor is working, the question is for whom?

Power to people, not city sheriffs!

What are the concrete effects of these "developmental" policies, also called gentrification, on the normal life of residents and inhabitants?

- TourismOur city has turned into a product for fast consumption, into yet another destination in the offer of the global tourism industry. 1,700,000 new visitors annually understandably chaned the city's image and life. The streets of Ljubljana became corridors of the shopping center. Expensive bars and caffes took up every square meter of public space, crowds obstruct walking or cycling on our everyday routes, souvenir shops pushed out basic food stores. In such artificially created conditions even the tourists are not feeling well, let alone locals, who in the "most beautiful city" remain merely unpaid extras. When the city authorities praise themselves with the exceptional profits of tourism they don't mention that those were also created at the expense of the inhabitants who have nothing from it.

- Increase of rents, prices in shops, of services and payment ordersWith the increased demand for touristic accommodation, rents took a leap. In the center, many homeowners, some on the account of the possibility of higher earnings, others, due to ever-increasing costs, decided that they will no longer be renting their apartments to tenants for a longer period of time, but will advertise them as Airbnbs that are more profitable. The old residential houses in the center have been transformed into hostels or smaller hotels. In parallel with the elitization of the city, other costs of living - from food prices to services and payment orders - have also increased. Many had to move to the outskirts. In the absence of favorable housing for rent, however, we can see an increase in the number of exceptionally bad rooms being offered for astronomical amounts.

- Bad jobs in the service sectorThe city does not hide the tendency to completely transform itself into an amusement park for wealthy tourists, and that the role of the locals is primarily to migrate to the center daily and service their needs. The development policy of the capital mainly affected the expansion of the service sector, in which profits were significantly multiplied, but this did not improve the working conditions of its employees. On the contrary, with the rising cost of living, royalty payments and wages have not increased, and working conditions are deteriorating with additional overtime, an accelerated rhythm of work or the proliferation of work commitments and work in unsuitable conditions.

-Exploitation on construction sitesDuring the renovation of the "most beautiful city" it is the workers on construction sites who are especially exposed to exploitation. Inhuman abuses, such as those which occurred during the construction of the Stožice Stadium, are well documented, but no one is held accountable for them. We are currently witnessing the pre-election construction races, when completions are done so that the mayor can take pictures of himself during the campaign with new achievements. What this means for the working conditions is revealed at Gosposvetska, Dalmatinova and elsewhere in the center: 12-hour work shifts for minimum wages without access to water and WCs. But the mayor and municipal officials are calmly looking away. They themselves should supposedly not be held liable for the risky circumstances in which the construction or renovations took place, even though they themselves chose and hired the "most favorable" companies that exploit the workers. Is granting concessions to "friendly" companies more of interest to them than the real needs of the people in the city? In addition to that we're witnessing a two-faced relationship between the authorities and newcomers. We can meet different categories of migrants in the center: welcomed tourists who are willing to spend money here, underpaid workers from the former Yugoslav republics, who build the infrastructure of "the most beautiful city" in desperate conditions, and migrants with uncertain statuses who often experience Ljubljana as unfriendly, racist and violent – until some of them don't disappear to unknown places, deported in police vans.

- For whom is the new Ljubljana not intended?Through the process of crowding out the less wealthy from the center, Ljubljana is becoming a more uniform city. The more the center adapts to the needs of tourist catalogs, it becomes clearer that the image of "the most beautiful city" does not belong to the junkies, the homeless, teenagers who are too loud and drink cheap wine on benches, the precariat, students and pensioners with thin wallets, the poor, and people without papers . The "cleaning" of the city core is done in at least two ways. Indirectly, through steep prices of products and services, and by changing the landscape of the city, for example by leveling the park in which the homeless people sleep, or by demolishing the buildings in which the junkies stay in order to build a parking lot. However, the "cleaning" of the city is directly carried out through a street wardens, who have recently acquired wide powers to sanction the "inappropriate" behavior of the inhabitants.On the other hand, we are confronted with the city authorities, who no longer answer for such obvious abuse of power, such as underhand bargains with private partners or purchasing sex services with promises of jobs.

- A different visionThe patronizing, neo-liberally-minded mayor pretends to know what's good for us. He does not allow the inhabitants to have an impact on the arrangement of their living environment. No city should be a terrain for draining the workforce and nature, or be a field for forging the profits of a handful on the shoulders of the majority. The city should be a place suitable for a decent life for all, not just tourists.From these and similar considerations, the inhabitants of the area developed squats or autonomous spaces (AKC Metelkova and AT Rog in Ljubljana, Argo in Izola, UP Inde in Koper, Sokolc in Novo Mesto) in empty barracks, devastated factories or old houses about which municipalities or private owners did not care for and let them deteriorate. We renovated these buildings, filled them with cultural, educational, political, artistic content and a children's program. Events are mostly not commercially oriented, they are free or based on voluntary contributions. Working in squats is driven by the will and desire to co-create the environment and the conditions in which we live. This way of self-organizing the fulfillment of needs enables the development of mutual cooperation, relations of reciprocity, solidarity and support among the residents.However, in the meantime, our squats have seen an increase in the price of the land they stand on, due to location, cultural capital, or both. They became interesting to create profits from, and consequently the municipalities (Ljubljana, Novo mesto) or the bad bank (in the case of Arga and UP Inde) began to pressure the processes of excluding the users of the autonomous spaces in order to claim the latter. Now, the "owners" want to appropriate and parasitize on the name ("brand") and the "cult status" of squats and their practices that have nurtured an alternative culture and a policy of resistance over the years of unceasing activity. But self-sown activities, creating and spreading the possibilities of experimentation in the project that is a community, contradicts the municipal system's supervisory system, which sees the lives and needs of the population as something to categorize, bureaucratize, control with cameras and wardens, criminalize with ever-new prohibitions, and the good practices of autonomous spaces as something to suppress with excavators, lawsuits in court, and the financial exhaustion of individuals and activists.

DEMANDS:1. We want to live in a city that is aimed mainly at fulfilling the needs of the inhabitants.2. We demand a housing policy that, regardless of one's social situation, enables access to quality housing. Dwellings for everyone! Empty spaces to the use (and self-administration) of the community!3. We demand a limitations to the growth of food prices, basic services and basic living costs.4. We demand the respect for granted labor rights, decent payments for overtime or regular employment, the work of migrant workers, and the improvement of the working conditions of all.5. We oppose profit-driven policies, which divide people into welcome consumers, overpaid laborers and "redundant" people also in our own city.6. Ljubljana should be a safe city with accessible services for all - without harassment of police, racial profiling and violence. Also, all health and social services in the city should be accessible to everyone under the same conditions, irrespective of the type of status and economic situation.7. Users of Autonomous Spaces are co-creators of life in the city. The municipality should resign from vengeful actions against the people of Rog and from the absurd Center Rog project, which is at odds with the needs of the community. More autonomous spaces in Ljubljana and all other cities!8. Free public transport, clean air and more green areas!9. We demand an inclusive budget, and that decision-making be in the hands of the inhabitants, especially on issues relating to living conditions. Power to people, not city sheriffs!